232 U.S.

186
34 S.Ct. 297
58 L.Ed. 564

CHAPMAN & DEWEY LUMBER COMPANY and Chapman

& Dewey Land Company, Plffs. in Err.,
v.
ST. FRANCIS LEVEE DISTRICT.
No. 82.
Argued December 12, 1913.
Decided January 26, 1914.

Messrs. Henry D. Ashley and William S. Gilbert for plaintiffs in error.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 187-190 intentionally omitted]
Messrs. Samuel Adams, H. F. Roleson, J. C. Hawthorne, and N. F. Lamb
for defendant in error.
[Argument of Counsel from pages 190-194 intentionally omitted]
Mr. Justice Van Devanter delivered the opinion of the court:

The chief controversy in this case is over the title to about 1,500 acres of
unsurveyed lands in Poinsett county, Arkansas, which were part of the public
domain at the date of the swamp-land act of September 28, 1850 (9 Stat. at L.
519, chap. 84), and the Federal question to be considered is whether, under the
operation and administration of that act, these lands have passed from the
United States, or are still its property.

Although within the exterior lines of a township surveyed in 1840 and 1841,
they, with other lands, were excluded from the survey, were meandered as if
they were a lake, and were designated upon the official plat as a meandered
body of water called 'Sunk Lands,'a name frequently applied in that region to
areas which subsided during the New Madrid earthquake, a little more than a
century ago, and subsequently became submerged. Other unsurveyed areas,
designated as meandered bodies of water, were also shown upon the plat. The

township was approximately 6 miles square, and the plat bore an inscription to
the effect that the total of the surveyed areas was 14,329.97 acres, so the
unsurveyed areas represented as water must have amounted to 8,000 acres or
more.
3

After the enactment of the swamp-land act, the state requested that the
township be listed as swamp lands, and patented to it under that act, both of
which were done, the former in 1853 and the latter in 1858. In requesting the
listing, the state described the township as containing 14,329.97 acres, the total
of the surveyed areas as inscribed upon the plat, and in making the list, the
Secretary of the Interior took the same total and deducted 514.30 acres in
fractional section 16, which already had passed to the state under the schoolland grant, thereby making the listed area 13,815.67 acres. The patent
embraced lands in several townships, the portion of the description material
here being: 'Township 12 north of range 7 east. The whole of the township
(except section 16), containing thirteen thousand, eight hundred and fifteen
acres and sixty-seven hundredths of an acre . . . according to the official plats of
survey of said lands returned to the General Land Office by the Surveyor
General.'

In the state courts the levee district, the plaintiff, claimed title to the lands in
controversy under the swamp-land act and an act of the state legislature in 1893
(Laws [Ark.] 1893, p. 172), granting to the levee district 'all the lands of this
state' lying within the boundaries of the district; and the defendants opposed
this claim upon two grounds: One, that if these lands had passed to the state,
the defendants had succeeded to the title by riparian right in virtue of their
ownership, under conveyances from the state in 1871, of the fractional sections
and subdivisions abutting on the meandered area called 'Sunk Lands;' and the
other, that the lands in controversy had not passed to the state, but were still the
property of the United States. The trial court sustained the plaintiff's claim and
entered a decree accordingly, which was affirmed by the supreme court of the
state, the chief justice dissenting. 100 Ark. 94, 139 S. W. 625.

Both courts found as matter of fact from the evidence produced at the trial that
at the time of the survey and at the date of the swamp-land act the unsurveyed
area designated upon the plat as 'Sunk Lands' was not a lake or permanent body
of water, but only temporarily overflowed, and was not distinctly lower or
materially different from the adjoining lands; and with this as a premise it was
held that the lands in controversy did not pass to the state or to the defendants
with the adjoining lands as an incident of riparian ownership, but were
conveyed to the state by the patent issued in 1858, and thence to the levee
district by the state act of 1893.

If the patent conveyed these lands to the state, we are not concerned with their
subsequent disposal, for that is a question of local law. But did the patent
include them? This, of course, is a Federal question. In answering it in the
affirmative, the state courts regarded the words 'Sunk Lands,' shown upon the
plat, as meaning that unsurveyed area to which they were applied was land, and
not water, and also regarded the words, 'The whole of the township (except
section 16),' as used in the patent, as embracing all that was within the exterior
lines of the township, except section 16, whether surveyed or unsurveyed, and
even although meandered and excluded from the survey. We are unable to
accede to this view of either the plat or the patent.

Had the plat shown that all the lands were surveyed, it doubtless is true that the
words 'Sunk Lands' would not have indicated the presence of a body of water,
but would have been taken in much the same way as would such words as
'valley,' 'broken hills,' or 'level plateau.' But the plat showed, as did also the
field notes, that the area to which the words were applied was not included in
the survey, but was excluded therefrom, and meandered as a body of water, and
also that the adjoining sections and subdivisions were surveyed as fractional, as
is usual with lands abutting on a lake or similar body of water. Thus, what
appeared upon the plat had the same meaning as if this area had been called
'Sunk Lands Lake.' And that the officers of the state and of the United States so
understood is shown by the fact that in the proceedings preliminary to the
issuance of the patent, as also in the patent, this and similar areas were excluded
in specifying the amount of land in the township.

Of course, the words in the patent, 'The whole of the township (except section
16),' are comprehensive, but they are only one element in the description, and
must be read in the light of the others. The explanatory words, 'according to the
official plats of survey of said lands, returned to the General Land Office by the
Surveyor General,' constitute another element, and a very important one; for it
is a familiar rule that where lands are patented according to such a plat, the
notes, lines, landmarks, and other particulars appearing thereon become as
much a part of the patent, and are as much to be considered in determining what
it is intended to include, as if they were set forth in the patent. Cragin v. Powell,
128 U. S. 691, 696, 32 L. ed. 566, 9 Sup. Ct. Rep. 203; Jefferis v. East Omaha
Land Co. 134 U. S. 178, 194, 33 L. ed. 872, 878, 10 Sup. Ct. Rep. 518. The
specification of the screage is still another element; and, while of less influence
than either of the others, it is yet an aid in ascertaining what was intended; for a
purpose to convey upwards of 22,000 acres is hardly consistent with a
specification of 13,815.67 acres. Ainsa v. United States, 161 U. S. 208, 229, 40
L. ed. 673, 680, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 544; Security Land & Exploration Co. v.
Burns, 193 U. S. 167, 180, 48 L. ed. 662, 671, 24 Sup. Ct. Rep. 425; 3 Washb.

Real Prop. 5th ed. 427. Giving to cach of these elements its appropriate
influence, and bearing in mind that the terms of description are all such as are
usually employed in designating surveyed lands, we are of opinion that the
purpose was to patent the whole of the lands surveyed, except fractional section
16, and not the areas meandered and returned, as shown upon the plat, as bodies
of water. That it is now found, as shown by the decisions below, that these
areas ought not to have been so meandered and returned, but should have been
surveyed and returned as land, does not detract from the effect which must be
given to the plat in determining what was intended to pass under the patent.
Niles v. Cedar Point Club, 175 U. S. 300, 306, 44 L. ed. 171, 173, 20 Sup. Ct.
Rep. 124; Hardin v. Shedd, 190 U. S. 508, 520, 47 L. ed. 1156, 1158, 23 Sup.
Ct. Rep. 685.
9

As, then, the lands in controversy were not included in the patent, and, under
the findings below, did not pass to the state or to the defendants by riparian
right with the adjoining fractional sections and subdivisions, it follows that they
remain the property of the United States. Niles v. Cedar Point Club, supra;
French-Glenn Live Stock Co. v. Springer, 185 U. S. 47, 46 L. ed. 800, 22 Sup.
Ct. Rep. 563; Security Land & Exploration Co. v. Burns, supra.

10

But it is said on behalf of the levee district that, even though the lands were not
included in the patent, they passed to the state under the swamp-land act
independently of any patent, and passed thence to the district under the state act
of 1893. The contention is not tenable. The lands were never listed as swamp
lands, and their listing does not appear to have been even requested; doubtless
because they were not surveyed. Assuming that in fact they were swamp lands,
the state's title under the swamp-land act was at most inchoate, and never was
perfected. Not only so, but the state relinquished its inchoate title to the United
States as part of a compromise and settlement negotiated in 1895, and the
relinquishment is binding upon the levee district as a subordinate agency of the
state. Little v. Williams, 231 U. S. 335, 58 L. ed. , 34 Sup. Ct. Rep. 68.
See Carson v. St. Francis Levee Dist. 59 Ark. 513, 533-535, 27 S. W. 590.

11

The levee district was therefore not entitled to prevail in respect of the
unsurveyed lands.

12

Decree reversed.